


just double dare me (and i promise now that i'll stay)

by benwvatt



Category: The Resident (TV 2018)
Genre: Domesticity, F/M, Pining, bed sharing, i'm easily won over by tropes okay, lots of conrad making fun of nic bc i live for their banter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-29
Updated: 2020-06-29
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:42:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,273
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24976291
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/benwvatt/pseuds/benwvatt
Summary: “Yeah, goodnight,” he echoes back, lifting the comforter. And then, more slowly, “I kind of missed sleeping next to you.”Set early in S1. In which Nic is tipsy and Conrad takes her home, as a best friend/ex should always do.
Relationships: Conrad Hawkins/Nicolette Nevin
Comments: 6
Kudos: 35





	just double dare me (and i promise now that i'll stay)

Conrad always takes her home from the bar. An easy thing to do, really 一 there are sixteen steps between the curb and her front step, and Nic’s black sneakers scuff against concrete as he pulls her, laughing, to the door, and she, for whatever reason, tugs at his collar as her ring scratches against his skin.

But, without exception, he’s Nic’s designated driver, for lack of a better word. Devon usually taps a finger at his watch, saying he has rounds in the morning, and this particular night he’d even thrown in, “I’ve got Priya. You have her. Figure it out, genius.”

(No one ever tells you this, but trying to figure out your relationship to your best friend/ex-girlfriend/coworker/potential love of your life? Harder than you’d think.)

“You’re very pretty. Anyone ever-er tell you that?” Nic’s eyes are glazed over, blinking back the self-induced fog, and she giggles at her own thoughts. “I bet they have. Bet everyone has.” She runs a thumb across his jawline and lifts her head in a confident nod, as if to affirm her own point.

“Mm-hm, whatever you say.” Conrad shakes his head, a subtle grin pulling at his lips. He clutches her hand and drags her toward the front door, squeezing once (just out of habit, he tells himself. A leftover ritual from the days when they were dating.) He’s used to the whisper of her late-night speech by now, and he knows better than to take her word for it. He’s fallen for _that_ one before. “You’re pretty too, y’know.”

It’s much easier to compliment her when she won’t remember it in the morning.

“Really? Really? Y’think so?” Nic frowns, forehead creasing. Her foot lands shakily on a step, and Conrad reaches out to hold her waist. Nic’s face scrunches up into a smile, all day-old concealer and worn confidence, and he can’t help but appreciate how softly she reacts. Drunk Nic is kind of his favorite version of her. He shakes off the thought; he’ll see a different side of her by tomorrow.

“Yeah, I know so. Of course you’re pretty. That one gala a few years back, when you wore the blue dress? Couldn’t stop myself from staring. No wonder I stayed and talked to you all night.” Conrad plays along before slipping a hand into her coat pocket for the keys. They rattle in the door. “We’re home now, by the way. Get some sleep.”

He’d make some comment about how she walks like a baby deer with a sprained ankle when she’s drunk, but he saves his words. He can tease her about it another time.

“Mm, thank you,” Nic says, toeing off her shoes. She slips her coat down her tired shoulders. It falls on the ground, and Conrad picks it up and places it onto the couch instead.

“Uh, do you want me to go now?” Conrad leans against the doorframe, trying not to get too close. It’s so easy to fall into the mindset of ‘this could lead somewhere’, and he has to rebuke the false hope when it comes to him.

“It’s so late,” Nic murmurs. “You could stay over, if you want? I, uh, wouldn’t mind the company.”

“Wait, really?”

“Yeah,” she says, yawning. “Who else is gonna hog the blankets, or eat my cereal in the morning?”

He grins. “You’re so mean. Those are false accusations, I’ll have you know.”

Nic rolls her eyes. “I’m going to bed. Extra toothbrushes are in the cabinet below the sink.”

It hurts a little, how familiar her home is. The bathroom still has that cracked tile from the time Nic dropped a hot iron, because she’s afraid it’ll cost too much to replace. There’s grapefruit soap on the counter, same as always, and the primary-color shower curtain that looks like a Twister mat is hanging from the rack. Conrad sighs. He runs a hand across the plastic, wondering if Nic will ever get around to replacing it. He used to insist it was too tacky, and Nic would say he didn’t live there anyway so it wasn’t his decision, and he’d counter with “well, of course, no respectable adult would own something this terrible-looking. _Duh._ ” And she’d laugh, saying she’d think about it. Conrad would be left to wonder if she ever did.

(It was far too late at night to have reasonable thoughts, okay? Sometimes you wanted to be responsible and go to bed, and other times you wanted to wax poetic about ugly polka-dot bathroom decor in your ex’s house.)

It takes twenty minutes before Conrad brushes his teeth and crawls into bed with Nic, every one of them heavy. He’s stayed over plenty of times, but this night feels different for some reason. More serious. Nic’s reading on her phone when Conrad knocks at her bedroom door, and he sort of wishes she were already asleep. It’d cut out some of the tension, at least.

“Um, goodnight,” she says, turning on her side.

“Yeah, goodnight,” he echoes back, lifting the comforter. And then, more slowly, “I kind of missed sleeping next to you.” He takes a calculated risk. Conrad knows her; if she doesn’t want this moment to have happened, she’ll pretend it never did.

There’s a lull, and then, “I did too.” Her voice is gentle against the traffic noise outside, hush across an urban landscape. “It’s not the same when I get all the blankets to myself.”

Conrad bites his lip. “So, it’s more comfortable when I’m gone, you mean? Thanks a lot.”

He can hear Nic nod in the dark, the comforter rustling.

“Always so critical. This, from a woman with, like, sixteen tiny throw pillows you have to _carefully_ remove from the bed every night so they don’t fall behind the headboard. And don’t get me started on your weird alarms in the morning-”

“Hey!” She giggles. “My alarms are perfectly normal. I’d hit you with a pillow, but they’re all the way across the room.”

“Using progressively more upbeat McFly songs as alarms from 6 ‘til 7? Nope, that’s bizarre.”

“So rude. Can’t believe I even let you stay over.”

Conrad smirks before he falls asleep, bundled in blankets that aren’t his. He wakes up to sunlight and ‘Obviously’ playing from Nic’s speakers, and he makes a point of insulting the colorful shower curtain in the morning.

“Not your bathroom, not your opinion,” she says, knocking her shoulder against his.

“Ah, but you’re inflicting harm upon me, with this eyesore in plain sight.”

Nic shuts him up pretty quickly, hopping in the shower and asking if he’d mind the sight of the twister-mat if she were there, too. So Conrad does the only (maybe) logical thing, slipping off his shirt and proceeding to kiss beads of water off Nic’s shoulders. It makes her ticklish, arms crossing together as shoulderblades lift.

“I still don’t get why you always do that!”

Conrad shrugs, innocent. “Makes you laugh.”

And when they’re sharing bowls of cereal in her kitchen, debating whether Lucky Charms are more sugar or more preservative, he’s finally calm. Not a worry in the world.

* * *

Devon finds out an hour later when they show up to work in yesterday’s clothes, and he makes a big deal of being all “see? don’t I always have the best set-up schemes? don’t I know what I’m doing?” It’s annoying when he’s right and even more so when he knows it, so Conrad pretends he doesn’t see a thing.

Nic finally goes shopping for a new, non-ugly shower curtain a week later, and Conrad gloats about it for a solid month.

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this in one night because, hello, there isn't enough fanfic for the resident? such a shame. be the fanfic writer you want to see in the world. (also: these two are very cute and I'm dying. why isn't there more conrad/nic content out there?)
> 
> thank you for reading! comments and kudos are always appreciated. I'm @benwvatt on tumblr if you ever want to talk :))


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